Forbes: This New Libor ‘Scandal’ Will Cause A Terrifying Financial Crisis!
- This New Libor ‘Scandal’ Will Cause A Terrifying Financial Crisis!
by Jesse Colombo, http://www.forbes.com/
Two years ago, a major scandal rocked the world after it was revealed that big international banks had long been manipulating the Libor interest rates to fraudulently boost their profits. As outrageous as the Libor rate-fixing scandal was, it pales in comparison to another Libor “scandal” that is occurring at this very moment, but has received virtually none of the attention that it rightfully deserves. The ultimate fallout of this much larger, little-known Libor “scandal” will be nothing less than an international financial crisis.
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The next two sections explain the basics of Libor and the rate-fixing scandal, but can be skipped for those who are already familiar with it.
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This Is The Real Libor Scandal
Amid all of the attention that the Libor rate-fixing scandal has received, the world is completely overlooking a far worse Libor “scandal” that has been occurring right under our noses this entire time. Though the Libor rate-fixing scandal is certainly no trivial matter, the losses caused by it amount to a few tens of billions of dollars, which is ultimately a drop in the bucket compared to the size of the global economy and financial system. In addition, as dramatic as the term “rate-fixing” sounds, the Libor manipulations only moved the Libor rate by a few basis points (basis points are .01 percentage points) for just a few brief moments at a time. The Libor manipulations did not move the rate by significant magnitudes such as from 5 percent to 2 percent, for example.
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The vastly worse Libor “scandal” that I am referring to is the fact that the Libor has stayed at record low levels for the past half-decade, which is helping to fuel a massive economic bubble around the entire world that will end in a devastating financial crisis that will be even worse than the Global Financial Crisis. Instead of causing a few tens of billions of dollars worth of losses like the Libor rate-fixing scandal, the “Libor Bubble” will gut the global economy by trillions of dollars.
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